Hot New Energy Car Action

There's a freaking mother load of innovation going on out there, especially in the Golden State. Check out this round-up and then check out Aptera and Tesla in depth. The auto times will soon be a-change-n my friends.

Cars and Buildings to Marry

Picture if you can cars running on the excess power produced by buildings. The dots that would frame this picture are beginning to pop up, and they're begging to be connected. One dot is Dynamic Architecture's wind powered skyscraper planned for Dubai.

Another is Ferreira Construction's 45,000 SF solar powered warehouse that might be the first U.S. net zero commercial building (net zero: producing more power than used). Pair these buildings with the Plug In Hybrid movement, put outlets in their parking spaces, and you start to get a picture of the marriage that might be made between cars and buildings.

The Wind Coalition

In response to a comment I made about the tens of Gigawatts of wind power installed in Germany and Spain, a blustery Texan noted that 4 Gigs up already, and lots more coming, his state alone eclipses both Britain and Greece. He commented that once Texans see themselves in a competition (see: Football, Rodeo, pride), they won't rest till they win it. The Wind Coalition site is a good place for tracking progress in South Central US, including the mighty TX.

World Gone Schitzo on Wind Power

WTF alert: what do you want? Do you want a world of landscapes free of windmills but with oceans rising, higher temps and more powerful storms and blackouts galore? Or do you want the same bad scene world but with power to get you through all those dark and stormy nights. Seems like our race is split about 50/50 on this. IMHO we're not going to stop climate change through half hearted actions over the next 20 years. It's coming no matter what we do and don't do. But we can keep energy flowing and maybe even crank a few more hundred more Gigawatts out of all that stormy weather if we choose right. See here.

News Just in: Google to Save World with New Energy

This comes as quite a relief as it didn't look like any one organization was willing to save the entire world. Google says its going to power San Francisco first with one Gigawatt's worth of solar and wind power and then see what it can do from there. Some folks will see this as idealism and a waste of Googlebucks that could be put to better use taking over all the online advertising in the galaxy. Me, I applaud each and every step towards new energy implementation. Go Google Go !!!

Hard Decisions: Make 'em Now

I'd like to have all oil and coal plants immediately replaced by levitating maglev solar windfarms powering the grid and fueling our all-hydrogen fleet of cars and trucks. But you know what, we don't get to have that yet. We may not get that for a long time. What we need now is time to stay afloat while the new tech is being developed. And some increased energy production that don't exacerbate the human component to climate change ... to the extent we understand it. See this article on a Colorado community grappling with solar and nuclear energy.

Using current technology, we can't build nearly enough renewable technology to replace coal and oil. That's true for us, and it's true for China and India. So in most cases, either/or choices don't exist. We've got to build both sustainable new sources to push those capabilities to the next level, even if we don't get much from it yet. But we've got to build real capacity too, and since there's a choice, we shouldn't make the worst one, i.e., traditional coal or oil fired power. New nukes keep us in the game long enough to discover, design and build what we're all looking forward to: what comes next.

Good Day Sunshine

I was just pawing through the current version of Popular Science and noticed their first Best of What's New (BOWN) Green Tech category. The winner of which this year is Silicon Valley based NanoSolar. Ironic, perhaps, in that there ain't no silicon required in their design, and that's the beauty of their creation. Far cheaper to make and move and install, this stuff is a true green energy game changer. Check out the PopSci article here, and here's NanoSolar's site.